Improving Your Focus

Focus is an extremely powerful skill; the ability to focus is essential to your success

Without being focused on the job in hand whether during day to day training, preparation phases and the execution of your on-the-day processes, your performance will take a knock.

By following these 7 steps you can improve your focus and achieve much more.

Is it important enough?

Understand the importance of each process to you and to what you want to achieve. Once you understand the level of importance attached to each of the factors that add towards your complete performance, it is easier for you to prioritise and you are more likely to succeed.

Focus on the things you can control.

Why waste time and mental strength focusing on issues that you have no control over? You will never be able to change their outcome so you will become down-heartened. When you are practising what you do have control over, you will be looking over your shoulder, worrying about the uncontrollable and asking “what if”. Clear these distractions out of your mind.

Stay relaxed under pressure.

Away from the training ground, find ways that will take away the stress and keep you calm. Slowly introduce visualisation into your preparation and bring in your calming techniques; with practice you will find you are able to de-stress the race situation. The calmer you can be, the higher your focus level.

A situation is fast approaching and you need to ramp up your focus level. What do you use to achieve this? Trigger words are short, easy and direct. It may even be a trigger phase; but something short and to the point. You’ve practised this in your visualisation sessions, rehearsed it on the training ground, as an individual or as a team. Studies have shown, saying the trigger word/phases heightens awareness.

Use Visualisation.

Visualisation is having the ability to see yourself perform long before the day of your race. Watch the video in your mind of you swinging the bat, keeping your head down, shoulders and arms relaxed, building speed through the upper legs and torso. Come the day, your mind will be tuned to focus on the right things.

Design a routine for yourself.

Elite athletes have built themselves a routine which helps them stay focused. Despite a change in physical surroundings, having a familiar routine calms the mind. It automatically knows what it is doing and what comes next. This gives you more “spare” mind capacity to stay focused on what is important.

Rate your focus daily.

Another entry for your training dairy. If you want to raise your focus you will need to record how successfully you have been executing certain tasks. Your mind will come to realise it needs to be focused because it will be evaluated afterwards. It will begin to recognise how important it is and will rise to the challenge.